Page 108 of I Choose You

Of course, he did.

I ignored him, even as he matched my steps up the stairs to the entrance. I didn’t give him the satisfaction of looking at him once, although I felt the burn of his gaze on me.

“You sure had balls going to his house. Telling the truth like that.”

Only then did I turn and face him as I climbed the steps. I’d kept a fast pace—damning my shoes—but he simply kept up by taking them two at a time. I maintained a blank expression, refusing to give him anything.

“It surprised me,” he admitted.

Whoopity-fucking-do.

At the lobby’s entrance, he shouldered the door open for me and leaned against it, letting me in. I didn’t buckle under his stare. I no longer could care what he thought of me. I was the enemy—message received.

“You’re not the same girl you were in high school.”

I scoffed, brushing past him. Knocking my shoulder into his didn’t make me feel bad either.

He didn’t deserve anything else from me. I left him behind me, continuing on my way to Kaden’s office.

I knew I wasn’t the same girl I was back then. I’d grown. I’d matured. I’d learned some hard life lessons to become the woman I was today. And ruining what I could have had with his brother was the hardest lesson yet.

37

KADEN

Between the jackhammering outside, the constant complaints in the office and the wi-fi and even the electricity being screwed up from the construction, I suffered from a bitch of a headache all day.

Drinking all that bourbon last night hadn’t helped.

After Brooke left, I got liberal with a couple of drinks. Fuck that run. I had needed something stronger. I was two glasses in when my brother FaceTimed me by accident. But while I had him on the phone, I told him all about what Brooke came over to tell me. He was surprisingly quiet, just having gotten done with dinner.

He didn’t say much, maybe because I was past buzzed but not drunk. Maybe he pitied me, because he looked really pensive as he listened. At any rate, it was a nice gesture when he stopped in my office this morning—without a word—and left a bottle of water and painkillers with me.

It hardly took the edge off, and it wasn’t until Pamela sighed at me after lunch, asking if my dog died, that I knew the culprit for my shitty mood.

I furrowed my brow. “I don’t have a dog.”

She rolled her eyes. “I know that.” She crossed her arms. “What is it then? A woman?”

That sobered me up. She might mention it to Dad.

I shook my head. “Nope. Drank a little too much last night.”

She smirked. “And with all that noise outside.” She patted my shoulder and left the room.

It was a woman though. Brooke. My head hurt, yeah, but my chest felt tight with a damn ache that wouldn’t go away anytime I thought of her.

I finished the rest of my water bottle and lowered my gaze to the papers in front of me when a knock sounded on my door.

“I left those papers on your desk, Pam.”

Wrong person. Brooke stood there.

Hands behind her back, she encouraged my gaze to focus on her tits with her shoulders back. I fought the urge to look, forcing myself to meet her eyes.

I’d stared into them when she rode me. Those dark green pools of desire locked on me as she gyrated on my dick.

Shit. I swallowed, forcing the errant image away.